B is for Beaver

B is for Beaver, or Leave it to Beaver, that is.

 This month marks the 15th anniversary of my blog, so I will be sharing previous posts from over 2000 that I have written. 

For those of you who might be blog-hopping here during the A-Z challenge, I'll catch you up on my blog aliases. Below is the post that explains the main characters in my blog. This originally appeared in May 2013, but I post it every few years for new readers here. So here it goes again. 

Also, there will be a little bonus section at the end. 

__________________________________

Leave it to Beaver or the Family We're Based On

You may have noticed that my family has the names of Ward, June, Wally, and Theodore. Some of you may have thought that those were our real names. However, some of you may have realized that those are our aliases based on names from the TV show  Leave It to Beaver. Leave It to Beaver was a situation comedy that aired from 1957 to 1963 and is still in reruns today. 

The show revolved around the Cleaver Family — Ward and June, the parents, and Wally and Theodore (also known as the Beaver), their sons. The premise of the show was that Beaver and Wally got themselves into scrapes that frustrated their parents, but from which everyone ultimately learned a lesson.

When I chose these aliases for my blog world, I didn't think much about the significance, except that there were the right number and gender in the Cleaver family, and they were from a show that made me smile when I thought about it.

In this post, I had planned to talk about the details of the Cleaver family and compare and contrast them with my family. However, that's too much work, so I'm just going to tell you a couple of things I found interesting about the making of the show that resonates with me.

--The makers of the show wanted to get gentle laughs. If anything got a really big laugh, they changed the script to make it more of a chuckle or smile. While I love a good belly laugh, the gentle laugh fits with my basic philosophy of life: Everything in moderation.

--June often wore pearls and heels when she was cooking and cleaning around the house. This is often made fun of because it was so unrealistic. However, once I heard an interview with the actress who played June, and she explained why those wardrobe choices were made.

 Apparently, the hollow at the bottom of her neck looked strange on film, so they had her wear pearls to fix the problem. Also, as the actors who played Wally and Beaver grew, they wanted her to be taller than them to still look authoritative as a parent. Thus, they had her put on heels. While you'll never find me cooking and cleaning in either pearls or heels, this reminds me that snap judgments are often wrong. Many times, you just don't know all of the facts.

--Leave it to Beaver was the first TV show in which the kids were the main focus and not the parents. I don't have anything meaningful to say about this except that I find it interesting.

Another time, I may go into individual episodes, but for now, you know where our blog names came from.

But Wait There's More!

 If you read here very often and you've been paying attention, you may have noticed that several other major and minor Leave It to Beaver characters show up in my posts.

B is for Bonus Pictures

We got back yesterday from an almost two-week trip to Texas. When we left, spring was starting to show itself with crocuses blooming and a daffodil here and there. Now the fruit trees are blooming, and some daffodils have bloomed, and some are starting to wither. I was very excited by what I saw, so I'm going to share a few pictures.

Daffodil

Phlox

Neighbor's ornamental cherry

Quince

Daffodil

Hellebore

Vinca

Sour cherry

Forsythia

Crab apple

Pear

Ornamental Plum

Until next time...

A is for Anniversary

A is for Anniversary theme for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

This month marks the 15th anniversary of my blog! I am amazed that I've stuck with it for that long. During this time, I've written 2075 posts. Some were about important things, and a whole lot were about trivial things. For this challenge, I'm going to be sharing some of these posts from the past. Now I have to figure out which 26 I'm going to share from the over 2000 I have. But today is easy. I'm going to start with the first blog post I ever wrote. 

_______________________________________

Sunday, April 17, 2011

What's in a name?

I've been toying with writing a blog for a while now and decided it was time to put thoughts into action. It all seemed so simple. Use one of the free blog sites and start writing. But wait, what was it going to be about, and what would I call it? My kids advised me that I needed a subject, or it would be nothing more than an online journal. Well, since I'm not that knowledgeable or passionate about any one subject, I decided that it would be personal reflections. My idea was to make comments about things I experience or see around me that other people may be able to relate to. Now, what to name it? Not as easy as it would seem. With the millions of blogs out there, there's not much left to choose from.

My first idea was Observations of an Everyday, Boring Life. However, it was suggested that I don't need to tell people ahead of time that my life is often boring. Next, I played with, Run of the Mill, Matter of Fact, and " So On and So Forth. All taken. Next was Watching Paint Dry, but that was also taken with actual webcams set up to watch paint dry. How about Dull as Dishwater?  Maybe that was giving too much away ahead of time again. (BTW, the original phrase was supposedly, "Dull as Ditch Water.") 

I was going to have to get creative. The family started brainstorming. Running with Safety Scissors and Your Guess is as Good as Mine. Both taken. My personal favorite was one I thought up- Lend Me Your Nose. A play on Lend me your ear but using the nose, indicating that you should take time to stop and smell the roses. 

After several more hours of deep thought, I settled on Live and Learn-Toss and Turn. This title is supposed to indicate that no matter what happens to us, we can always learn from it, and the unknown can still be a little scary and cause us to toss and turn. Or maybe the title just means that I was really tired and the rhyming of the words seemed good enough. This morning, my son asked me what name I came up with, and after I told him, he replied, "Well, it's not as bad as I thought it would be." I don't think I will ever be able to live down, "Lend Me Your Nose."

Until next time...

Note: I will be updating the rest of my Texas trip on Sunday, which is an A-Z day off. 

Lone Star State, Day Nine

 Swimming Holes

We considered several things to do today, but since there was a break in the heat with the cold front that came through last night, we decided on Krause Springs. Krause Springs, located 30 miles northwest of Austin, is 115 acre camping and swimming site with 32 natural springs. Two of them feed a swimming pool and swimming hole. Here are a few pictures from our outing today.

Guess what? We found more gardens here.
They weren't quite as manicured as the earlier ones we've seen on this trip, but we enjoyed them all the same. 

Some things were just budding, while other things were blooming.

Several of the trees had these large wind chimes in them. Their chiming
 was quite peaceful.

And speaking of trees, there were many large cypress trees in the area. We were impressed with the size of this trunk.

Some areas were difficult to maneuver around with the Cypress roots and rocks.

This is the spring-fed swimming hole. We had a good time people watching here.

We also enjoyed looking at the fossils in the rocks.

When I have more time, I will look these up, but they look like crinoids to me.

Our peanut butter sandwiches didn't quite fill us up, so guess what? Ward suggested we have more Texas BBQ on the way back to the hotel. They were out of ribs, so Ward had smoked chicken, and I had potato and pea salad sides. All were tasty.

Until next time...

Lone Star State, Day Eight

 Modern Art

San Antonio is a big city with lots to see and do, but the traffic and crowding were starting to get to us. So, we chose to visit the McNay Museum which is not in a main tourist area. It was also appealing because it was an indoor activity because temperatures were in the low 90s again.

Although the museum was recommended to us by friends, I was surprised that Ward wanted to go. The last time we visited a modern art museum was the Museum of Modern Art in Washington, D. C., and Ward was not impressed, especially with the abstract art. He didn't understand it or its purpose. But off we went without one disparaging remark from Ward. Below are pictures from our day. Today, get ready for lots of art pictures (with perhaps a picture or two of an animal).

The main part of museum is housed in Marion McNay's original Spanish style mansion.

Although the house was not a featured part of the museum, we enjoyed its architectural features.

The museum proper was full of school groups who were leaving soon, so we decided to start with the outdoor sculpture garden. Here and below are a few of the sculptures we saw.

This was supposed to represent a lizard. Later Ward told me he hated it.

They also had a lovely Japanese garden.

Neither Ward nor I have much of an art background, but we did recognize a few of the artists, like a Picasso that you see here.

and Georgia O'Keeffe

and Jackson Pollock

and Paul Gauguin

and Claude Monet

and Edward Hopper

And now it's time for our animals of the day with a sock monkey display...

And this little lizard that was peeking in the window.

After the museum, we were on the road again to Austin where we'll be for the next two nights. Friday afternoon traffic in two big cities was not fun, but we made it. For dinner, we went to a Brazilian steak house with one of Ward’s work friends. We spent three hours there catching up, and Ward enjoyed all the meat he could eat, while I enjoyed the extensive salad/cold bar.

Until next time...

Lone Star State, Day Seven

 Travel Day and Ice Cream and Rivers

Today, we traveled from Houston to San Antonio and because we were on vacation, we didn't hurry and made a few stops along the way. Below are some pictures from our day.

First stop was the Bluebell ice cream factory. Most people think their local ice cream is the best and Texans are no different. But I would agree that Bluebell ice cream is quite good.

I thought this little free library was cute. 

We love their motto.

Of course, we had to have some samples.

Although Bluebell has expanded their operations quite a bit, they haven't made it to Maryland yet. I was impressed when I learned that they still sell full 1/2 gallon cartons, not like the others who have reduced them 1 1/2 quarts. They are proud of that and print it on their box.

The area had a park with a statue of their logo, as well as a museum and observation deck where you could watch them making ice cream. They were making Christmas cookie ice cream when we were watching. No pictures were allowed in this area.

Even though we had just had ice cream, Ward asked about a good BBQ place for lunch. A most helpful lady steered us to Truth BBQ which was in the top 10 BBQ places in Texas in 2025. And believe me, there is a lot competition for that in Texas. Ward had ribs and I had a brisket sandwich. Both were quite good.

We were finally back on the road with only a few stops to take pictures of wildflowers.

 

At five o'clock, we finally arrived in San Antonio and checked into our hotel. Next up was the world famous River Walk. We had visited here years ago (are you getting tired of the "years ago" theme yet?😁) and this was something that Ward wanted to do again.

The River Walk sits below street level and is lined with sidewalks, shops, and landscaping. It is quite popular.

However, the San Antonio River was not as crowded as the sidewalks. We did a river tour on one of those little boats.

On our tour, we learned that they drain the river and clean it every couple of years. They had done it only a couple of months ago and found over 1000 cell phones among other things.

We headed back to our hotel a few blocks away. Luckily, it was starting to cool off. Earlier it was in the low 90s. However, it was not as humid as Houston, so it felt better.

Until next time...